Almost a decade on, Irwin's croc team reunites

Bob Irwin says he was "a little apprehensive" about reuniting with his late son's colleagues almost a decade after the crocodile hunter's untimely death in 2006.

"I hadn't seen these people for eight years or however long it was," Bob Irwin told the ABC's Inside Story.

"I'd sort of left their company on what you'd call not a joyous basis and I didn't know how they'd react."

Rumours had been circulating of a rift in Steve Irwin's inner circle around the time Bob left Australia Zoo in 2008.

Tensions between Mr Irwin and Steve's wife Terry were said to have reached breaking point, between the stress of Irwin's death and managing the zoo, which had grown into a major tourist attraction since Mr Irwin founded it in 1970.

"I was becoming a disrupting influence," Mr Irwin said of his 2008 departure.

"Not that I meant to be … I didn’t mean to be a disrupting influence — that wasn’t what I was trying to achieve."

Bob Irwin. (AAP) ()

Exacerbating it all was the all-but-unspoken agreement that Irwin's death would not be discussed.

"I haven’t opened up about the effect of Steve’s death on me to anyone - not even my husband," Nicole Byrne, Irwin's personal assistant, told Australian Story.

Ms Byrne recalls the last time she saw Irwin, at Cape York in August 2006.

"Saying goodbye to him at the camp site ... you don’t ever think that’s going to be your last goodbye to someone like that," she said.

Briano Coulter, who was with Irwin on the day he died, said he had tried to get Mr Irwin to open up.

"Not long after we lost Steve I said if he ever wanted me to discuss the circumstances around Steve’s passing, I would be more than happy to discuss it with him," Mr Coulter said.

"And Bob thanked me and he said that he wouldn’t like to have that discussion."

Although filming the show has reopened some wounds, including Mr Irwin's disappointment with cameraman Jason Lyons' candid interview with Studio 10 last year in which he publicly revealed the crocodile hunter's final words, the reunion has had its bright side.

"(It was) worth the drive just for the laugh alone with those guys," Ms Byrne said.